Service outage email templates
During an outage, customers want to know three things: is it you or them, what's affected, and when they'll hear more. This template answers all three with a timestamp, so replies stay accurate as the incident moves. It's built for replying to the flood of tickets during an incident, with variants for the all-clear and the follow-up explanation.
;cs-outage;cs-outage in any app.Variations
The same message for a different channel or tone. Copy the one that fits.
When the incident is over and you're replying to everyone who wrote in.
For answering chats during an incident.
When to use it
- Your product is down or degraded and tickets are arriving about it.
- An incident is resolved and you need to close the loop with everyone affected.
- A third-party outage is affecting your customers.
What to avoid
- Don't give a fix time unless engineering has confirmed it.
- Don't speculate on the cause during the incident. Explain later, once it's understood.
- Don't send the all-clear before you've checked it's actually fixed for customers.
The fields in this template
Retext fills these in when the snippet expands. In plain text they become [brackets] to replace by hand.
- Customer name
{fill:Customer name} - Their first name.
- Affected service
{fill:Affected service} - What's broken, e.g. "file uploads".
- Start time
{fill:Start time} - When it started, with time zone, e.g. "9:40am ET".
- Impact
{fill:Impact} - What customers can't do right now.
- What still works
{fill:What still works} - What's unaffected, so they can keep working.
- Status page link
{fill:Status page link} - Your status page URL.
- Your name
{fill:Your name} - Your first name.
- Current time
{time} - Inserts the current time.
- Today's date
{date} - Inserts today's date in your Mac's long format, for example "March 4, 2027".
Tips
- •The {time}, {date} stamp at the bottom shows when the information was true, which matters when the situation changes hourly.
- •Fill in the incident details once, then copy your filled-in reply into a temporary snippet so the whole team can send it during the incident.
- •Link the status page in every reply so customers stop needing you for updates.
Works in Zendesk, Intercom, Slack, Front and every other app
Retext types the snippet wherever your cursor is. To use a different version in one app, give it the same trigger and limit it to that app with per-app snippets. They go by app, not website, so every tab in your browser counts as one app.
During an incident, an admin can update the shared outage snippet with the live details in the app. Once each Mac syncs, every agent's next expansion uses the current wording, without a Slack thread full of copy-paste.
See Retext for TeamsQuestions
What should an outage email to customers say?
That you know about it, what's affected, what still works, where to get updates and when you'll next be in touch. Avoid guessing at causes or fix times.
How often should you update customers during an outage?
Every 30 to 60 minutes on your status page, even if there's no news. Reply to individual tickets when it's resolved.
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;cs-try-stepsCustomer support
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Hi [Customer name], A quick note: our support team is on reduced hours from [Start date] to [End date] for [Holiday]. Du…
Type ;cs-outage, get the whole reply
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